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Lot Essay
This vigorous study of the sun setting over the sea is a newly discovered addition to the series of Breton seascapes painted by O'Conor in 1898. It shares with its companions a boldly abbreviated handling of paint, with calligraphic strokes of thicker pigment applied on top of thin colour washes. The daring colour contrasts are also typical of the seascape series, extending here to the juxtaposition of bright pink, green and yellow in the sky. To arrive at such effects O'Conor had to increase the intensity of the colours found in nature, and in so doing he emerged as a sort of proto Fauve, a painter who made the conscious decision to go a step further than the stormy seascapes painted by Monet on Belle Ile in 1886.
The exact status of Seascape with sunset remains in doubt, but it would appear to have been an experimental work carried out in one or two sittings. As such, it can be related more closely to O'Conor's graphic works featuring the sea than to his completed paintings of the same subject. In a number of etchings dating from 1893, and again in several watercolours and gouaches from later in the decade, he represented the glow of the evening sun as it dipped towards the horizon, projecting a column of reflected light across the waves.
The seascapes on paper further reveal a keen interest in cloud formations, which has been indulged here by virtue of the decision to employ a vertical rather than a horizontal format for the composition. Just over sixty per cent of the canvas surface is given over to the sky. At the same time, the rocky shoreline seen in so many of O'Conor's other seascapes has been omitted, presumably in order to stress the elemental appeal of the scene. With no shoreline visible, we are presented with what may be described as a sailor's perspective of the watery domain, which is much more immediate than that of the casual observer positioned on dry land.
Scientific analysis of the picture has revealed the use of emerald green (copper arsenite) in the sky, a pigment that has been found in other Breton works by O'Conor but which became obsolete seventy years ago due to the nature of its ingredients.
We are very grateful to Jonathan Benington for providing the catalogue entry for the above lot.
The exact status of Seascape with sunset remains in doubt, but it would appear to have been an experimental work carried out in one or two sittings. As such, it can be related more closely to O'Conor's graphic works featuring the sea than to his completed paintings of the same subject. In a number of etchings dating from 1893, and again in several watercolours and gouaches from later in the decade, he represented the glow of the evening sun as it dipped towards the horizon, projecting a column of reflected light across the waves.
The seascapes on paper further reveal a keen interest in cloud formations, which has been indulged here by virtue of the decision to employ a vertical rather than a horizontal format for the composition. Just over sixty per cent of the canvas surface is given over to the sky. At the same time, the rocky shoreline seen in so many of O'Conor's other seascapes has been omitted, presumably in order to stress the elemental appeal of the scene. With no shoreline visible, we are presented with what may be described as a sailor's perspective of the watery domain, which is much more immediate than that of the casual observer positioned on dry land.
Scientific analysis of the picture has revealed the use of emerald green (copper arsenite) in the sky, a pigment that has been found in other Breton works by O'Conor but which became obsolete seventy years ago due to the nature of its ingredients.
We are very grateful to Jonathan Benington for providing the catalogue entry for the above lot.